Book Review: Sweet Evil by Wendy Higgins

Title: Sweet Evil
Author: Wendy Higgins
Publisher: HarperTeen
Genre: YA (paranormal)
Why I read it/how I found it: 2012 Debut Author Challenge

Description:
What if there were teens whose lives literally depended on being bad influences?

This is the reality for sons and daughters of fallen angels.

Tenderhearted Southern girl Anna Whitt was born with the sixth sense to see and feel emotions of other people. She’s aware of a struggle within herself, an inexplicable pull toward danger, but Anna, the ultimate good girl, has always had the advantage of her angel side to balance the darkness within. It isn’t until she turns sixteen and meets the alluring Kaidan Rowe that she discovers her terrifying heritage and her willpower is put to the test. He’s the boy your daddy warned you about. If only someone had warned Anna.

Forced to face her destiny, will Anna embrace her halo or her horns?

Review:
I'm sure people who consistently enjoy paranormal romances will find interest in this story. For me, I love paranormal stuff done well, like Everneath and Paranormalcy. Unfortunately, there are more bombs than successes in this genre. While structurally I couldn't enjoy Sweet Evil, the mythology presented in it is very unique, given the angel/demon thing has been done a lot in the YA category. I think what I liked most about it is that it didn't shy away from the actual presence of God, or angels, or anything, rather than kind of just ignoring Him. The few angel books I've read have done this before.

This has a lot of standard tropes you see in YA paranormal romance.
-The sweet, innocent female protagonist. That would be Anna. But OF COURSE Anna isn't socially accepted by her peers. Because she's "different."
-The dark, tortured, but hott (yes, two t's, because Anna insists he's hott with two t's)love interest. Who also happens to be British. And in a band. And rich. And an emancipated minor. And did I mention the hott factor? That is Kaidan.
-The guy who gets thrown in halfway as a potential love interest, but she can't get over how her heart goes thump-thump over the first love interest, the one her soul sings to.
-Insta-love! Four days is enough to feel love toward a guy, right? RIGHT?

This did hold more entertainment for me than most other books in this genre lately, and it wasn't HORRIBLE, but it wasn't even good. I'm sure a lot of people will enjoy it who like other stuff similar to this, but for people looking for something different, Sweet Evil doesn't deliver quite enough. 

Other information: This is a planned trilogy, but the rights to the other books haven't been bought yet. Wendy Higgins's website is here.

Book Review: A Breath of Eyre by Eve Marie Mont

Title: A Breath of Eyre 
Author: Eve Marie Mont
Publisher: Kensington Publishing
Genre: YA (Er...contemporary? Fantasy? Fanfiction? Yeah, let's go with fanfiction.)
Why I read it/how I found it: 2012 Debut Author Challenge

Description:
Emma Townsend has always believed in stories—the ones she reads voraciously, and the ones she creates in her head. Perhaps it’s because she feels like an outsider at her exclusive prep school, or because her stepmother doesn’t come close to filling the void left by her mother’s death. And her only romantic prospect—apart from a crush on her English teacher—is Gray Newman, a long-time friend who just adds to Emma’s confusion. But escape soon arrives in an old leather-bound copy of Jane Eyre…

Reading of Jane’s isolation sparks a deep sense of kinship. Then fate takes things a leap further when a lightning storm catapults Emma right into Jane’s body and her nineteenth-century world. As governess at Thornfield, Emma has a sense of belonging she’s never known—and an attraction to the brooding Mr. Rochester. Now, moving between her two realities and uncovering secrets in both, Emma must decide whether her destiny lies in the pages of Jane’s story, or in the unwritten chapters of her own.

Review:
I love Jane Eyre. It's one of my favorite books. Which is why this book was so disappointing for me.

Many sections of the book are plopped straight out of Jane Eyre. Conversations, actions and such. Which, I've read alternative POVs from famous books/plays before with the same dialogue, however this book did not either A.) Add more scenes/dialogue than the original or B.) Give new perspective to the scene. Whenever she was in Jane's world, I found it boring and also, really unnecessary to the plot of her own issues in her life. It did drift away from the original novel toward the end of her journeys as Jane, but then it was just stupid.

Rochester's blamed for everything. Bertha's craziness, her situation, all of it. Despite the fact that Charlotte Bronte says insanity runs in Bertha's family, that Rochester stayed with Bertha for four years trying to help her, and also that asylums in the nineteenth century were horrible. Absolutely horrible. Yet Emma thought it would have been a good idea to send Bertha to doctors and nurses. Honestly, for someone so smart she should know a bit about history and the fact that insane people were treated horribly back then. Rochester did Bertha a kindness keeping her in Thornfield. Was he perfect? No, but judging him on our standards today is unfair.

Bertha's insanity is reduced to a depression, rather than the homicidal insanity it truly was. I shook my head the whole time Emma decided she needed to "save Bertha" rather than forgive Rochester.

And what killed me the most--Emma claimed Jane was not a feminist. Because she stuck with Rochester rather than Bertha. I can't even muster the energy to write down how completely wrong and stupid that reading is. Flat-out stupid to call one of the most progressive feminist novels for its time anti-feminist.

Emma's story outside of Jane's world is all right. Fairly stereotypical with mean girls and boys and such. I felt that a lot of things that should be more serious and drawn out in Emma's life were cut short because of the pages spent as Jane.

Other information: This is the first book in a trilogy, the other two A Touch of Scarlett (taken from The Scarlet Letter) and A Phantom Enchantment (taken from The Phantom of the Opera). Eve Marie Mont's website is here.

Book Review: Endlessly by Kiersten White

Title: Endlessly
Author: Kiertsen White
Publisher: Harper Teen
Genre: YA (paranormal)
Why I read it/how I found it: Last book in the Paranormalcy Trilogy

Description:
Evie's paranormal past keeps coming back to haunt her. A new director at the International Paranormal Containment Agency wants to drag her back to headquarters. The Dark Faerie Queen is torturing humans in her poisonous realm. And supernatural creatures keep insisting that Evie is the only one who can save them from a mysterious, perilous fate.

The clock is ticking on the entire paranormal world. And its fate rests solely in Evie's hands.

So much for normal.


Review:
So, as is no secret to this blog, I adore the first two books, Paranormalcy and Supernaturally. They're fun, hilarious, with characters that jump off the page and have great voices. 


The last book in a series can be tricky. There's so much pressure to finish everything off in a satisfying way, to tie up all loose ends and get the characters in the place that they should end up. Endlessly does this beautifully. There really is no other way this series could have ended, for every character, from Evie and Lend, to Arianna and Reth. 


Endlessly hits a great pace, by page thirty you just can't stop reading until the end. The plot moves along without dragging anything along. As with the rest of this series, the humor doesn't stop and I found myself laughing just like the first two.


Evie and her journey has meant a lot to me, it's saved me from drudgery of college work and reading for something fun and meaningful. I loved seeing her story wrap up, although I'm sad that it's over now.

Other information: This is the last last last book in the Paranormalcy trilogy and world (sad day, right?). The first book has been opted for film. Kiersten White's blog is here.

Going on

*Climbs out of hole*
*Blinks in the brightness of the internet's light*
Hello, again.
I've been pretty much absent for a while. I hit a slump with my book, a huge one that I haven't hurdled past yet, and I'm working on still. Other stuff has happened, like my cousin getting married and my brother leaving for the Navy (he's going to be a doctor!), and my sister coming to visit with her kids.

But mostly, I felt worn out.

Which is weird, because it's summer and I should be all jazz hands about it. But things just got...moody. You know, when it happens for no good reason? When you don't want to do anything? Pretty much, I've been reading. Which is why my only posts here have been for book reviews. Oh, I pretended like I was working. I made a youtube channel to review all of the books I read, since I only do one a week here and don't get a chance to discuss them all. And I read, I've babysat.

But what's really important, I've been slacking on. My book. And for some reason, that just climbed into this blog as well, and I felt uninspired. I didn't want to post just for the sake of posting, which is why all we have are two book reviews since my slump hit.

Upon realizing that I'm leaving for school in a month, I know I have to get my act together and finish this book. Just the first draft of it! So I'm using this blog for accountability. I will be doing my regular post and keeping an update on how I'm doing.

Here's to ending ruts. Cheers.

Book Review: Beautiful Creatures by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

*Waves* Long time, no see. Things have been a little crazy for me right now, which I why I haven't been blogging, but here we go again. :)

Title: Beautiful Creatures
Authors: Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Publisher: Little, Brown
Genre: YA (paranormal)
Why I read it/how I found it: Saw a movie about it was coming out and had to read it.

Description:
Lena Duchannes is unlike anyone the small Southern town of Gatlin has ever seen, and she's struggling to conceal her power and a curse that has haunted her family for generations. But even within the overgrown gardens, murky swamps and crumbling graveyards of the forgotten South, a secret cannot stay hidden forever.

Ethan Wate, who has been counting the months until he can escape from Gatlin, is haunted by dreams of a beautiful girl he has never met. When Lena moves into the town's oldest and most infamous plantation, Ethan is inexplicably drawn to her and determined to uncover the connection between them.

In a town with no surprises, one secret could change everything.


Review:
This book is really unique in the fact that it's a YA paranormal romance, but the BOY narrates it. That was very refreshing and I'm sure made it stand out when the authors were querying it. Ethan could feel like adult women writing from a teenage boy's perspective at times (like when he goes on about Southern architecture or when he explains he or his friend Link does something/thinks a certain way because they're boys). But it wasn't horrendous, just something I noticed.
Lena, his love interest, was pretty unique herself. She kept things important to her, but to others seemed like junk, on a necklace. Her struggle to fit in and yet not wanting to at the same time felt very raw and real for someone in high school, especially someone like her who never got to have a "normal" childhood. 
Of course, being the star-crossed lovers that they are, it got a little tiring to hear them say:
"It's not right for you to be with me." (Lena)
"I don't care! I want to be with you!" (Ethan)
On...and on...and on. This book is 563 pages long. I feel like 1/4 of it is the two of them with this same conversation. Also, I think this book could've been slimmed down a bit. Extra scenes/incidences/details here and there. The plot didn't feel very concise to me. But in the end, there's a lot of twists and turns I didn't see coming, yet at the same time, the authors put clues in that guide you there. The climax is very thrilling, with just enough action, suspense, stakes, and emotion to top it off in the grand finale.
The paranormal elements, Lena and her family being "Casters" (witches, essentially, but don't call them that) was interesting and well-thought out, although I feel like the magical elements will come out more in the later books.
I have a feeling those in the South might not take to some of this here. Ethan felt very superior to those in his town, determined he wasn't "one of them." He had been raised by educated people, learning to speak right and look to more than what's in their town, Gatlin. The people of the town, besides the outcasts and educated, are judgmental, closed-minded, vindictive, and basically every negative aspect you can think of in a stereotypical Southern small town. Ethan talks about how because his mother didn't want to join the DAR or Ladies Auxilary, had been educated, vegetarian, and a liberal, she'd been treated poorly when she lived and even when she was dead. Which, for me, was surprising because one of the authors grew up in the South. It seems to me like she didn't have much warm, fuzzy feelings about the place she grew up in. While the town created conflict and antagonism, Ethan's smug attitude and his pre-judgement of the town didn't seem to reflect any of the good things about the South, either. I've never been to the South, but I guess I just hoped for something more than stereotypes that I'd seen before.


More information: This is the first in a series of four, with the last one to come out this October. The novel's website is here. Kami Garcia's website is here. Margaret Stohl's website is here. Warner Bro.'s is adapting Beautiful Creatures into a movie, and is currently filming.

Book Review: Partials by Dan Wells

Title: Partials
Author: Dan Wells
Publisher: Balzer + Bray
Genre: YA (science-fiction)
Why I read it/how I found it: 2012 Debut Author Challenge.

Description:
Humanity is all but extinguished after a war with partials—engineered organic beings identical to humans—has decimated the world’s population. Reduced to only tens of thousands by a weaponized virus to which only a fraction of humanity is immune, the survivors in North America have huddled together on Long Island. The threat of the partials is still imminent, but, worse, no baby has been born immune to the disease in over a decade. Humanity’s time is running out.

When sixteen-year-old Kira learns of her best friend’s pregnancy, she’s determined to find a solution. Then one rash decision forces Kira to flee her community with the unlikeliest of allies. As she tries desperately to save what is left of her race, she discovers that the survival of both humans and partials rests in her attempts to answer questions of the war’s origin that she never knew to ask.


Review:
Whew! This book is pretty amazing, I have to say.
While Dan Wells isn't a "debut" author, this is his YA debut. I haven't read any of his adult books, but I 've been to several writer events and he's talked, and I've always found him very engaging when talking about writing. He's got it down pretty good.
I love the plot of this book. There's so many different threads that all interweave together to create their world and their conflicts.Oftentimes, I feel like YA science fiction is skimpy on the science. But this is definitely not Partials. Which, ok, I'm no science major, but to me the science here seemed to be sound, and rather than putting together some shoddy details to twist around the author's plot, the science behind this one is logical, and as far as I can tell, pretty legit. 
It takes a little while for the story to really pick up. Part One builds up the world, but for me was just barely keeping me there. Part Two and onto Part Three is when I really became invested in what the characters were doing, because they had a clear path ahead of them, rather than a sort of looping around their world to get a feel of it.
I was shocked a few times during this, with twists I didn't expect to happen. And when you read so much, it can become hard to be shocked. But this one got me a few times.
However, if you're a pretty hard-core YA fan, this might not be the one for you. While YA in the fact that Kira is 16, it doesn't feel YA. Not in the writing style, and certainly not in the characters. Kira's a medic, has a job, and has a boy talking to her about getting married. Their Senate has passed the Hope Act, which demands that women at a certain age (at the start of the book, it's eighteen), must be pregnant in order to produce subjects for them to find a cure for the RM virus and continue the human race. The Senate talks about lowering the age to sixteen, Kira's age. While I've read YA books that has a teenager with a job, or married/thinking of marriage, or pregnant, I've never seen one with all three. Or, for that matter, had the few teenagers in the book acting like adults.
The love story in this one kind of fizzles for me. Kira and Marcus are already dating when the book starts, and I just never got the connection with them. The romantic storyline is very minimal, and I feel might have been thrown in there just for the sake of making the more YA-ish. But I do now ship Kira with another character, Samm. I don't know if it'll happen in other books or not, but I ship it.
Also! This book is great if you're looking for racial diversity. Kira's Indian (she doesn't specify if that means Indian or Native American, but still, diversity!). Several other characters are Japanese, Hispanic, and black. 


Other information: A second book, Fragments, is due out February 2013. Dan Wells's website is here.

Avoiding the Stupid Protagonist Syndrome

Have you ever read a book, watched a movie, or seen a TV show in which a character makes a stupid choice? Not a mistake. A mistake would be yelling at your mom when she hasn't done anything because you've had a rough day. That's a mistake we as human beings make, and help our characters become three-dimensional. A stupid choice is if a character puts themselves in a dangerous position for no good reason when they know there's danger.
A comment I often see on Goodreads reviews from low ratings is the reviewer complaining that the main character is "stupid." And they then go on to list the stupid things the character does. I've read some books lately which made me think, "Wow this character is stupid."
So how do we avoid our own protagonist from being stupid? I think that this clip from The Office explains it:

Just ask yourself "Would an idiot do this?" If you look objectively and see that yes, an idiot would do it, then don't have your character do it. Easy peasy. In theory, at least.